A basic message has crystallized over the last week as editors and reporters cover the basic talking points and conduct interviews with Chinese officials: there's a double standard at work, all our censorship is legal, and China had nothing to do with Google hacking.

Here are the latest developments:

Let's start teaching 'Net morality. From Reuters: "China's Education Ministry published a notice on Monday reminding schools they should be monitoring and filtering Web content, as well as teaching 'Internet morality.'"

We had nothing to do with it. China's official news agency, Xinhua, conducted an interview on Sunday with a Ministry of Industry and Information Technology spokesperson, and the government is now willing to take a tougher line against the accusations that it was somehow behind the sophisticated cyber attacks on Google and 33 other companies.

"Accusation that the Chinese government participated in cyber attack, either in an explicit or inexplicit way, is groundless and aims to denigrate China," said the spokesperson. "We firmly opposed [sic] to that."

It's all legal. In a separate interview from Sunday, Xinhua spoke with the State Council Information Office and received the now-common defense of China's censorship: it's all legal, and therefore not a problem.

"A spokesperson with China's State Council Information Office told Xinhua in an exclusive interview, that China is regulating the Internet legally to build a more reliable, helpful information network that is beneficial to economic and social development," said the news service. That "more reliable, helpful information network" currently blocks access to Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, despite the fact that censorship regulations allegedly cover only "online information which incites subversion of state power, violence and terrorism or includes pornographic contents."

"China is willing to cooperate and exchange opinions on issues about Internet development and management with other countries, but opposes firmly to any defiance of Chinese laws, or intervening Chinese domestic affairs under the pretense of 'Internet management' regardless of the truth," the spokesperson said.

We don't want any trouble. If you're curious why news outlets, a group that might seem highly interested in Internet and press freedom, make little noise on the subject, one editor's perspective might help. The Qingyuan Daily, a local paper from Guangdong Province, ran a January 1 editorial from editor-in-chief Pan Wei. It concluded: "The editor-in-chief of this newspaper says: the best newspaper is one that does not cause trouble."

No more dirty text messaging. China now runs a new nationwide scanning system that attempts to crack down on dirty jokes and pornographic messages sent over SMS. This has led to some dissatisfaction in China, with its huge mobile user base, especially because the keyword scanning system officially opens up every user's text messages to government scrutiny.

One Chinese blogger notes, "Sending dirty jokes is a kind of etiquette for mobile socializing in China, and from my observations, if the person is the King of Jokes he will have a good base of friends, and a wide circle of contacts. Even if you haven’t seen them for a long time, when you do meet up it’s with a big smile, because as people get closer and closer there are numerous dirty jokes that will start to overflow in the heart and there is no way to suppress it."

"Democracy" and "freedom" simply mean "self-interest." The People's Daily newspaper is a major mouthpiece for the Chinese Communist Party. In today's edition, the paper blasted the US stance on Internet freedom as hypocritical. The piece, authored by "ace PD reporter He Zhenhua," points out the various legal and not-so-legal ways that the US keeps an eye on Internet activity.

"Let us look at 'network freedom' in the US: In order to resist Internet pornography, the U.S. 'Children's Internet Protection Act' [note: this is the Child Online Protection Act, or COPA] American authorities have enacted requires all public network resources to curb Internet child porn, a serious crime in the country; in order to respond to threats, Pentagon has developed a new type of troops—cyber troops, and also adopted several measures to beef up the military's cyber warfare capacity; shortly after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the US Congress approved the Patriot Act to grant its security agencies the right to search telephone and e-mail communications in the name of anti-terrorism."

The bottom line is that US talk of Internet freedom and democracy is about "double standards" and always has been. "US self-interest [is] behind all these frequently changed or shifted means or tactics."

It's... sort of true. While refusing to equate the behavior of China and the US when it comes to the Internet, Salon writer Glenn Greenwald nonetheless agreed with the basic argument about US hypocrisy. If you want to see illegal spying in action, and with no consequences, look no further than the vast system of warrantless wiretapping that the US legalized long after the fact.

Message to Congress: grow a spine.

"It goes without saying that countries like China and Iran—along with many of our closest allies—are far more repressive of internal dissent than is the US," writes Greenwald. "But the role of the American Congress is supposed to be to check surveillance abuses by the US Government and to safeguard the privacy of American citizens inside the US Instead, they do the opposite: flamboyantly condemn transgressions by other governments (at least the ones we don't like) while enabling, empowering and protecting our own government officials and private telecoms who illegally spy within our own country."

Xinhua loves Ballmer. Piling onto the "double standards" bandwagon, a Xinhua editorial says that "the United States often gossips about other countries' policies on administering the Internet, but at the same time it takes similar measures to minimize the spread of illegal information. That shows that the United States takes a strict line with other countries, but not with itself."

But there's a voice of sanity crying in the wilderness, and his name is Steve Ballmer of Microsoft. "Noting that most countries exert some sort of control over information, Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer said Friday his company must comply with the laws and customs of any country where it does business," writes Xinhua with approval.

"The US can argue that China’s 'Great Firewall'—a system of filters and bottlenecks that effectively shutters the country within its own intranet—is an illegal restraint on international trade because it bars foreign companies from competing, via the Internet, in the vast Chinese market," says the group.

"WTO sanctions have teeth because they can be enforced through other countries’ raising of tariffs against Chinese exports. China in other recent trade disputes has shown it will abide by WTO rulings it disagrees with (reserving its right to request WTO rulings, to China’s benefit, in other matters). For the US government, playing the WTO card also demonstrates seriousness about curbing Chinese censorship, while confining the dispute to an international legal process and avoiding a direct confrontation with China."

US using Twitter to turn Iran into bloodbath? Another People's Daily article alleged that the Iranian dissatisfaction so evident in the wake of the recent national election has been ramped up by US cyberwar efforts. "It was America that initiated Internet warfare, using YouTube videos and Twitter micro-blog misinformation to split, incite, and sow discord between the conservative and reform factions…to bring about large-scale bloodshed in Iran," said the piece.

The lighter side of censorship? It's not just Internet porn that angers the authorities; taking off one's pants on the subway is also forbidden.

The Guangzhou Subway Company has banned "no pants" rides on its subway system. "The public can't accept the act of removing pants inside subway cars, and the act will frighten some passengers, so we will forbid any such act from now on," said an official.

68 Reader Comments

I can't believe you lend credence to the hypocrisy message Nate. The biggest issue is not that the Chinese government is spying on people while they are on the Internet, but that the Chinese government is explicitly blocking content by government decree, which we do not do in the US.

Originally posted by Game_Ender:I can't believe you lend credence to the hypocrisy message Nate. The biggest issue is not that the Chinese government is spying on people while they are on the Internet, but that the Chinese government is explicitly blocking content by government decree, which we do not do in the US.

I'm not sure I get the difference. Blocking by decree only an extension of spying on people (if you don't verify, how can you enforce?). Both nations have legitimized such spying on citizens. The difference is the US is talking out of both sides of its mouth while the Chinese only use one. They aren't complaining about us doing what we do, just that we pretend we don't.

Besides, the intent of COPA was to block by decree. Further efforts on the the part of ACTA negotiations, et al, is trying to drive that farther. That they use their powers for political dissidents and we use it for kiddie porn and sharing Pants on the Ground is irrelevant.

Whatever happened to "Smart Power"? All these politicians and diplomats and none of them know a damn thing about dealing with China. When was the last time that public condemnations of anything has gotten China to change? All you're doing is pissing them off and getting them to dig their heels in.

Originally posted by sckmcck:Whatever happened to "Smart Power"? All these politicians and diplomats and none of them know a damn thing about dealing with China. When was the last time that public condemnations of anything has gotten China to change? All you're doing is pissing them off and getting them to dig their heels in.

What is the alternative though? The US government was roundly criticized about its tacit approval of Chinese censorship when they said nothing about it. And then what came of it? Massive hacking efforts against US interests from the Chinese government. What do they have to lose by speaking out about the practices now?

Originally posted by Game_Ender:I can't believe you lend credence to the hypocrisy message Nate. The biggest issue is not that the Chinese government is spying on people while they are on the Internet, but that the Chinese government is explicitly blocking content by government decree, which we do not do in the US.

I'm not sure I get the difference. Blocking by decree only an extension of spying on people (if you don't verify, how can you enforce?). Both nations have legitimized such spying on citizens. The difference is the US is talking out of both sides of its mouth while the Chinese only use one. They aren't complaining about us doing what we do, just that we pretend we don't.

Besides, the intent of COPA was to block by decree. Further efforts on the the part of ACTA negotiations, et al, is trying to drive that farther. That they use their powers for political dissidents and we use it for kiddie porn and sharing Pants on the Ground is irrelevant.

The difference is that the US government does not run a country wide filtering system stopping access to content that would make people unhappy about it. It bothers me that people try to draw moral equivalence between the actions of the US government, which I know aren't perfect, and the Chinese government.

Originally posted by Game_Ender:I can't believe you lend credence to the hypocrisy message Nate. The biggest issue is not that the Chinese government is spying on people while they are on the Internet, but that the Chinese government is explicitly blocking content by government decree, which we do not do in the US.

The US blocks certain images and videos by decree with extremely harsh penalties (20 years in prison), although unlike China, the ban isn't specifically on political content.

Originally posted by Game_Ender:I can't believe you lend credence to the hypocrisy message Nate. The biggest issue is not that the Chinese government is spying on people while they are on the Internet, but that the Chinese government is explicitly blocking content by government decree, which we do not do in the US.

The US blocks certain images and videos by decree with extremely harsh penalties (20 years in prison), although unlike China, the ban isn't specifically on political content.

It doesn't block anything, its make trafficking and possessing them illegal. That's different then the current party in power blocking access to the competing party's websites or content.

"Let us look at 'network freedom' in the US: In order to resist Internet pornography, the U.S. 'Children's Internet Protection Act' [note: this is the Child Online Protection Act, or COPA] American authorities have enacted requires all public network resources to curb Internet child porn, a serious crime in the country; [...] shortly after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the US Congress approved the Patriot Act to grant its security agencies the right to search telephone and e-mail communications in the name of anti-terrorism."

Let us look at 'network freedom' in the US: In order to resist Internet pornography, the U.S. 'Children's Internet Protection Act' [note: this is the Child Online Protection Act, or COPA] American authorities have enacted requires all public network resources to curb Internet child porn

is the same thing as blocking access to information about tiananmen square?

Sorry Nate, as with what was already said by a few commenter earlier, the US isn't perfect but they don't go around blocking images and article about guantanimo. Why would you even hint that they have some sort of argument to fall back on. We all know what they are spewing will be all over in china and anything that we have to say will be blocked. I'm sorry I don't think you should give them a damn inch in this argument. They are taking facts and twisting them as par for the course. Yea we're evil because we stop child porn and it's the same thing right?

Originally posted by Game_Ender:It doesn't block anything, its make trafficking and possessing them illegal. That's different then the current party in power blocking access to the competing party's websites or content.

Blocking and making trafficking and possessing illegal with severe penalties are both forms of heavy-handed censorship. I agree that what the US does is substantially less malicious than what China does because the US doesn't censor stuff because it's political; that is, it doesn't censor to perpetuate itself.

edit: Now that I think about it, the US does censor stuff for political reasons: it tried to block images of fallen Iraqi troops' coffins in the MSM and classifies information for political, not national security, reasons. That said, China's political censorship is FAR more extreme.

FTA: We had nothing to do with it. China's official news agency, Xinhua, conducted an interview on Sunday with a Ministry of Industry and Information Technology spokesperson, and the government is now willing to take a tougher line against the accusations that it was somehow behind the sophisticated cyber attacks on Google and 33 other companies.

"Accusation that the Chinese government participated in cyber attack, either in an explicit or inexplicit way, is groundless and aims to denigrate China," said the spokesperson. "We firmly opposed [sic] to that."

OK, so Google and VeriSign need to show the evidence they have to the proper US & Chinese authorities (assuming they haven't done that yet, which I imagine they have).

US and Western civil liberties may be under attack from fringe elements in our societies, but the fact we can even have these debates publicly and openly sets us apart from the Chinese population.

In Canada we allowed a regional minority group to hold a referendum on staying within Confederation: Where's Tibet's referendum?

In Canada, we granted aboriginal minorities distinct national status, essentially autonomous nations within our territory: Where is the Uigher's national autonomy? Or the dozens of other minority groups the Hans are trying to breed out?

Originally posted by win2k:This is pretty crappy journalism. What Ballmer said was nothing out of norm for any company.

I'm not implying that it was. I'm simply pointing out that -China- is explicitly using the statement to support MS' position and to counter Google's claim that the government needs to change its censorship policy.

Originally posted by Game_Ender:I can't believe you lend credence to the hypocrisy message Nate. The biggest issue is not that the Chinese government is spying on people while they are on the Internet, but that the Chinese government is explicitly blocking content by government decree, which we do not do in the US.

I certainly was not trying to get into some sort of debate about whether there's a moral equivalence between what the two countries have been doing on and to the Internet (I don't think there is). But the debate is more about "openness," "freedom," and "legality"--and there's a fairly obvious case to be made that the US has been engaged in plenty of illegal surveillance and control techniques and that it has plenty of caveats about "openness of its own--no child porn, no online gambling, etc. China is of course conflating the various issues, but it's not wrong to see that the US controls and surveills the Internet, even if preemptive censorship isn't the technique used.

that freedom of speech is sometimes used as a political tool doesn't make it any less a thing worth fighting for. it kind of bothers me when people try to rationalize china's actions by saying that the US does the same thing - any self-respecting liberal should be outraged by both.

as an aside, it doesn't seem to me that nate is justifying the chinese position, just trying to provide balanced reporting.

From Mission:Impossible--"Should you be caught or killed, the Secretary will disavow all knowledge of your actions."

quote:

It's all legal.

Of course. In China, censorship of political speech has always been perfectly legal and above-board.

quote:

We don't want any trouble.

Trouble, what trouble? In China there is never any trouble because nothing troublesome is allowed to take place. And if it does take place, no one is allowed to report it. And if no one hears about it, why then it never happened, did it?

quote:

No more dirty text messaging.

Yes, dirty jokes about Chinese politicians are most troublesome. And so, they must be censored.

quote:

"Let us look at 'network freedom' in the US: In order to resist Internet pornography, the U.S. 'Children's Internet Protection Act' [note: this is the Child Online Protection Act, or COPA] American authorities have enacted requires all public network resources to curb Internet child porn, a serious crime in the country; in order to respond to threats, Pentagon has developed a new type of troops—cyber troops, and also adopted several measures to beef up the military's cyber warfare capacity; shortly after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the US Congress approved the Patriot Act to grant its security agencies the right to search telephone and e-mail communications in the name of anti-terrorism."

Which of course completely evades the issue, which is that China censors and outlaws political speech whereas the US does not.

quote:

It's... sort of true. While refusing to equate the behavior of China and the US when it comes to the Internet, Salon writer Glenn Greenwald nonetheless agreed with the basic argument about US hypocrisy. If you want to see illegal spying in action, and with no consequences, look no further than the vast system of warrantless wiretapping that the US legalized long after the fact.

It's not true at all--not in the slightest. Imprisoning, re-educating (brain-washing) and even executing political dissidents for their political speech is and always has been common in China. Nothing of the sort happens in the US, period, and no amount of posturing about child pornography and the Patriot Act will ever make it so. IMO, the hypocrites are the ones who think there's some kind of direct correlation.

quote:

"But the role of the American Congress is supposed to be to check surveillance abuses by the US Government and to safeguard the privacy of American citizens inside the US Instead, they do the opposite: flamboyantly condemn transgressions by other governments (at least the ones we don't like) while enabling, empowering and protecting our own government officials and private telecoms who illegally spy within our own country."

No, no, and no. Congress is one of three branches of the US government; the Executive, the Judicial, and the Legislative. Each branch is supposed to serve as a "check" on the other branches in case a branch gets out of hand or too big for its britches. Congress can check the Executive, which can be checked by the Legislative, which can both be checked by the Judicial, which itself can be checked by the Legislative or the Executive, and so on and on. The central idea for such checks and balances is to keep the government off the backs of the people, whose freedom under the Constitution is considered paramount. There simply is no comparison to be made between the political rights a Chinese citizen has in China and the political rights an American has in the US. Anyone who thinks otherwise has been drastically short changed in his education.

quote:

But there's a voice of sanity crying in the wilderness, and his name is Steve Ballmer of Microsoft. "Noting that most countries exert some sort of control over information, Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer said Friday his company must comply with the laws and customs of any country where it does business," writes Xinhua with approval.

I repeat, in the US it is against the law for government to "exert control" over political speech. The Supreme Court just reaffirmed this basic American freedom a couple of days ago when it struck down McCain-Feingold as unconstitutional. Obviously, Ballmer's comments make perfect sense in every area apart from legal protections of political speech. Notice how in all of these comments the Chinese *never* mention critical political speech unless it is characterized as "attempts to destabilize the power of the state." I mean, the Chinese can talk about child pornography and the Patriot Act all they like, but they do nothing except avoid discussing the real bone of contention, which is that in China, unlike in the US, certain forms of political speech are against the law. In China the rights of the state trump the rights of the citizen when it comes to political speech.

quote:

US using Twitter to turn Iran into bloodbath? Another People's Daily article alleged that the Iranian dissatisfaction so evident in the wake of the recent national election has been ramped up by US cyberwar efforts. "It was America that initiated Internet warfare, using YouTube videos and Twitter micro-blog misinformation to split, incite, and sow discord between the conservative and reform factions…to bring about large-scale bloodshed in Iran," said the piece.

Most people in America would read this and think it was a slice of satire from a Saturday Night Live broadcast--it really is funny on its face--that YouTube videos and Twitter micro-ramblings might ever be considered dangerous to society. But in countries where the exercise of free political speech is unknown and fiercely punished whenever it erupts, such speech scares the pants off the people in power--it frightens the daylights out of the tyrants. Thus they take it very seriously and seek to censor it and snuff it out wherever it arises. In many countries and cultures around the world the notion of unfettered political speech and satire is as alien a thing as it can possibly be, and is very often viewed as a direct threat to the power of the state. Sometimes I marvel at the naivete of the supposedly educated people inside the US who at least pretend to be blissfully unaware of the many faces of politics around the world.

The Chinese government may dance around the issue and make straw arguments (the Patriot Act in the US is similar to essentially trying to erase Tiananmen Square from our own history, at least internally), but it will be a hard sell to make the civilized world believe that there's any justification for blocking human rights sites. Cultural differences, public interest, peace, whatever they say, it won't fly, and as a civilized society we should not stand it. No government is perfect, but that doesn't mean we should turn a blind eye to forced ignorance about human rights.

Originally posted by Game_Ender:I can't believe you lend credence to the hypocrisy message Nate. The biggest issue is not that the Chinese government is spying on people while they are on the Internet, but that the Chinese government is explicitly blocking content by government decree, which we do not do in the US.

I'm not sure I get the difference. Blocking by decree only an extension of spying on people (if you don't verify, how can you enforce?). Both nations have legitimized such spying on citizens. The difference is the US is talking out of both sides of its mouth while the Chinese only use one. They aren't complaining about us doing what we do, just that we pretend we don't.

Besides, the intent of COPA was to block by decree. Further efforts on the the part of ACTA negotiations, et al, is trying to drive that farther. That they use their powers for political dissidents and we use it for kiddie porn and sharing Pants on the Ground is irrelevant.

The difference is that the US government does not run a country wide filtering system stopping access to content that would make people unhappy about it. It bothers me that people try to draw moral equivalence between the actions of the US government, which I know aren't perfect, and the Chinese government.

It should bother you that the US is being discussed on the same level as China. Too bad that we in the US have eroded our principles to the point where this is possible. Just 10 years ago, it wasn't possible.

Originally Posted by Game_Ender The difference is that the US government does not run a country wide filtering system stopping access to content that would make people unhappy about it. It bothers me that people try to draw moral equivalence between the actions of the US government, which I know aren't perfect, and the Chinese government.

The only true check for equivalence is the result. Thus, this is not a false equivalence as the end result is the same. Either system; get caught, go to prison. I don't agree with country wide filters either, but I do accept that China is a sovereign nation that HAS the RIGHT to decide what is and is not appropriate for its citizens. They are after all sovereign enough to loan us money, correct? A real stand against the Chinese Government, not treating its people as though they were US citizens would be NOT borrowing trillions of dollars from them. (You should keep in mind that if they behave as terrorist AGAINST us, we will very quickly remind them that they're not US citizens and instead treat them like we're China. So again, what do we really believe in!) With all the money we've borrowed from China, any stand that we take is nothing more than staging, because the real power resides with the lender.

You seem to be stuck on modality. In the US where, real and actual children no longer need be involved for someone to be charged with having committed certain crimes AGAINST A CHILD, a nationwide filter might actually seem a desirable alternative. Whether the filter is real or in the back of your mind as you think twice about links you receive from people you don't know before you click on them, especially if they're not "Work Friendly" because of the "Work Filters" while you're at work! How could these two systems not be seen as very similar if not outright the same? Are some not loosing jobs for what they post on Facebook or Twitter even when the office doesn't have a clear policy or/and they never notified workers that 'Pictures WE deem objectionable can get you fired even when the activity pictured takes place offsite and while we're not paying you'! Moreover, during the Iraq war, journalist and other writers lost very real jobs simply for stating opinions that were disagreeable. Dude, we may have the appearance of not being China in this country, but that doesn't prevent us from using their tactics. The difference as stated above is that the Chinese government is very clear (mostly) about what is and is not tolerated and how they're going to deal with it. Here, you won't know for certain that something isn't covered by free speech, until the Supreme Court rules against you.

Originally posted by sifta:It should bother you that the US is being discussed on the same level as China. Too bad that we in the US have eroded our principles to the point where this is possible. Just 10 years ago, it wasn't possible.

You mean 10 years ago, documents weren't classified because they would be unpopular and sexual images of children were legal to possess?

Originally posted by Preternatural:The difference as stated above is that the Chinese government is very clear (mostly) about what is and is not tolerated and how they're going to deal with it. Here, you won't know for certain that something isn't covered by free speech, until the Supreme Court rules against you.

If you put it like that I'd rather have the former...

quote:

Originally posted by WaltC:Which of course completely evades the issue, which is that China censors and outlaws political speech whereas the US does not.

And what does all that political speech really get you?

Jesus the US still hasn't even managed to pass a healthcare bill through Congress yet, whereas these days the Chinese just get on with it (like they have with High Speed rail for example).

I think I'd rather know that I didn't have political freedom of speech but my government was actually competent.

Our stockholders' corporations and China's government have much, much in common. An internet filter at work or someone's being fired for a "Vote So-and-so" bumper sticker are routine here. (At one time in our history, corporations jailed, beat, and shot people [for one example, look up "Pinkertons"] -- such things look likely to happen again.) China is continually extenuated in our newsmedia -- rather than continually vilified, as USSR was -- for one reason: that our corporations rely on them financially. There is collusion, deceit, and inhumanity on both shores -- but concentrating on the outside face of D.C. will distort this truth and hide the underlying evil of which we really should be aware.

Short story: Never trust the newsmedia, the magazines, the popular books and opinions. Dig deeper. We won't see our own condition accurately unless we do.

Originally posted by WaltC:Which of course completely evades the issue, which is that China censors and outlaws political speech whereas the US does not.

And what does all that political speech really get you?

Jesus the US still hasn't even managed to pass a healthcare bill through Congress yet, whereas these days the Chinese just get on with it (like they have with High Speed rail for example).

I think I'd rather know that I didn't have political freedom of speech but my government was actually competent.

That's the point. Our government was founded by people who distrusted government so they designed it to move slowly. Authoritarian governments can implement things faster, but they can come to a wrong decision quickly just as easily the right one. Its vary hard to reverse governmental decisions, so the fewer decisions it makes the better.

After reading about the no-pants rides (aces!) I'm reporting the People's Daily for bringing the Chinese People into disrepute by publishing nonsensical garbage that they've sucked out of their thumb, to wit, "The report also noted that a pair of 400-gram trousers will consume 200 kilowatts per hour of energy in washing and drying". What report? WTF is a 'kilowatt per hour'? Domestic power outlets here in the UK supply a maximum of 3kW, are Chinese households rated for 66 times as much?

The bottom line on the official USA complaints about Chinese censorship is that it has NOTHING to do with a concern for the Chinese people and everything to do with China blocking for profit site based in the USA.It's a trade dispute, not a freedom dispute.The USA has never cared much about freedom in other countries, never has never will. Just as long as we can make money off said country we don't give a rats ass about their freedom or lack thereof.

Originally posted by charleski:"The report also noted that a pair of 400-gram trousers will consume 200 kilowatts per hour of energy in washing and drying". What report? WTF is a 'kilowatt per hour'? Domestic power outlets here in the UK supply a maximum of 3kW, are Chinese households rated for 66 times as much?

A kilowatt per hour is probably a bad translation of a kilowatt hour. And I presume the energy usage is over the lifetime ownership of the trousers. That said I'm not really sure the last paragraph makes sense in the article .

Originally posted by sckmcck:Whatever happened to "Smart Power"? All these politicians and diplomats and none of them know a damn thing about dealing with China. When was the last time that public condemnations of anything has gotten China to change? All you're doing is pissing them off and getting them to dig their heels in.

It's just as damaging to China to "dig their heels in" as it is to anyone else. They want to shoot themselves in the foot, let 'em. If they want to deal with the global economy and the world at large, then they're going to have to endure justified criticism. Maybe their shuk and jive works for their own populous, but the rest of the world has been there, done that, and knows the bullshit.

Originally posted by sckmcck:Whatever happened to "Smart Power"? All these politicians and diplomats and none of them know a damn thing about dealing with China. When was the last time that public condemnations of anything has gotten China to change? All you're doing is pissing them off and getting them to dig their heels in.

You're right. *cough* Pussy * cough*

We should send them biscuits. Tasty biscuits. With big, white, frosting hearts on them. That'll soften those Commie hearts and get them to lighten up on freedom-loving rabblerousers.